New friends

We had two of our former classmates over for dinner last weekend. This is a picture of one of them. A sweet girl from Finland, we've loved getting to know her and we're sad that she'll be going back in 2 weeks! Living overseas means people are often coming and going.

Steph also got the luxury of a women's night out. Rick took on Micah duty for a full afternoon and night as I spent the night at a friend's. Some of our friends live on the Asian side which is too far to return from after dark by myself. So, I fully enjoyed eating and chatting with some other expat women. Five of the women have two or three kids each (most of the ones with two have another one in the oven)! We're happy to keep up with just one! I'm amazed at how they do it.

Local specialty

We've been passing the same interesting looking restaurant for 3 months now and we finally decided to stop in and have a taste. I should have taken a picture downstairs, but I wasn't feeling touristy enough. At this fantastic place there are two women making fresh mantı, which is a favorite here. It is most easily described as mini-ravioli. They make the dough fresh everyday, put a bit of minced meat inside and then boil it (I assume). Top it with super garlic-y yogurt and hot spices and yum! Rick also tried a chicken dish that tasted much like fajita meat. Anyway, we loved the decor with huge wooden pitch forks and other miscellaneous farm equipment. If you ever come to visit, this place will be on our list to visit...unless of course we find some place cooler.

Street Performers

Yes indeed....what is this man playing in the streets of Istanbul? I think it is a goat. Anyway, the music was quite good!

We got a dog!!

At the fair that is. Micah's first pet is 4 times his size and doesn't need diapers. We got him at the church fair for the very fair price of less than a dollar. We were quite amused lugging him through the subway to get back to our house. Once home, Micah took full advantage of his new jungle gym.

Too cute

Micah turns 18 months next week. These photos make me laugh so I am throwing them on the web. I realized that possibly 30% of our photos of Micah are of the eating process. They start to blend together, but they're always cute. Anyway, as he turns 18, here is the latest news:

- Micah has just busted out 3 new teeth this week bringing the total to 15. I don't know how many they get, but this was one painful week. It's nice when they all come together!

- Micah is starting to get some "words" out that we can really understand. "Daw" = dog, "Doo" = shoe, "Dad" = Dad :), "Doose" = juice. "Ah Duh" = all done. These are the most frequent.

- His current favorite activities are hide-n-seek, and doing anything outside. We know he wants to go outside when he points at the back of his bedroom door where his monkey backpack is and then brings us his shoes. If we play dumb, he goes and stands at the door and points until we get the picture.

- His new favorite book is "Dog" by Matthew Van Fleet, photos by Brian Stanton. It's a very cool photo book with lots of tabs to pull to make the "daws" wag their tails and scratch.

- New bedtime ritual: Read 3-4 books. Turn on nightlight and ceiling fan (yeah!!) and then say goodnight to each animal on his wall border. Tiger and elephant get smiles...middle of the room lion gets giggles....and last ones in the room - rhino and monkey - get laughs. Then into the crib with big smiles and arms wrapped around sleep dog and sleep frog. Sweet dreams!

- He's still sweet-talking the other folks on mass transit. Last month he received a brownie, several candy bars, several home-maid muffins, and more. One 12 year old girl on the ferry took his photo on her phone and then e-mailed it to us! This new generation of technology-literate kids will be quite interesting!

- That's all that I can think of in my tired state. Hope you enjoyed the update.

Level 2 Passed!!!

Hooray! Steph passed level 2 of Turkish! What a stressful week preparing for that test! This is a picture of me celebrating with my classmates that we survived another level. Please note there are no men. Actually, we did have one guy in our class, but he didn't come out to lunch with us. All of these wonderful women are married to or dating Turks! They are from all over the world. They have a leg up on speaking the language because of their built-in tutors at home, so we better get a TV so I can catch up. ;-) Most of us will be in the same class again on Monday as we start level 3. We had delicious Chinese food to celebrate! That's one food I'm glad to have here!

First big boy cup

Well, we finally took the time to try a big boy cup....

and amidst some sputtering he loved it! I was grateful to find the last plastic cup in the store and grateful it did not cost an arm and a leg. However, my jaw did drop at a few other unique items...

One plastic cup = $3 good price
One bag of jumbo marshmallows = $10 crazy
One tube of diaper cream = $23 unfathomable